Micro-observations of how space informs my style of coaching by Yvonne Thackray
This piece builds upon the work first published in 2017 "Making sense of what I do, how my coaching practice is taking shape”.
Feedback is especially useful to further understand how I am developing my coaching style and approach. From my clients’ feedback, there is a general acknowledgement to my depth and breadth of knowledge, understanding of coaching, and how I flexibly apply it to meet my client’s challenges. By creating that safe space necessary for coaching, I am able to hold that invisible bubble-like container to allow my clients to explore the things most relevant to them without judgement. Those who are most capable of maximising what I offer are typically those individuals who are already confident in themselves and exude a sense of independence and maturity, and have usually already started their self-development process.
Defining my coaching style
My coaching style and interests typically dictate the type of clients who choose to work with me. Often, they have a powerful internal map (awareness) of what works and what doesn't work for themselves. You could say that they are confident in their own skin. At the same time, they have a healthy attitude towards acknowledging their strengths and weaknesses, and in seeking a coach that can genuinely connect with the person who sits in front of them, and enables them to reach their potential(s). They may be students through to professionals and senior executives at various levels within organisations from different sectors.
The challenges which each of my clients brings will vary in complexity based on their situation. My intent is to build our coaching relationship to become more that of a mutual exchange where it allows for the coaching conversation to become broader and deeper because:
We are now meeting as equals from which an interdependent relationship has been co-created that fits their agenda and optimises my coaching strengths.
Continually listening to their needs, directly or masked under other problems.
Asking pertinent questions to enable them to share what they’re ready to share
Sensing, empathising and sharing words that describe their situation and role within it.
Being in a safe space to think through their assumptions, beliefs, and rationale to achieve their goals. This may also include offering my perspectives and opinions to help them to consider other ways of looking at things and assimilate what's most relevant, or not, and to consider solutions for their challenge better.
Clarifying their intentions and supporting them to be accountable for their actions driven by their internal motivations
Acknowledging, celebrating and keeping track of their progress to change, as their witness.
Applying my style in coaching conversations (informal) and coaching sessions (formal)
Knowing when I'm engaging in an informal or formal coaching session, aka having a coaching conversation versus a coaching session, will not be a significant differentiator to the individual I'm engaging with, though it can have an impact on finances.
The value achieved from having a ‘momentary’ coaching conversation lies in catching the moment, and providing an immediate place for a person to process their excitement, feelings and emotions around something that’s just occurred. Being available in those ‘moments’ and giving them that space to express their thoughts and feelings can often help to mitigate carrying unnecessary latent stress that can have an immediate and longer-term impact to their work. And so being available then, as well as for scheduled coaching meetings (formal sessions), provides an alternative way to be accessible and support my clients in dealing with their different needs that can impact their overall goal.
This can make it challenging for some coaches as nothing has been contracted for – in that formal sense – but instead relies on something far deeper and more implicit because it's often dealing with their immediate well-being and feelings of justice/fair treatment with someone they work with or report to. Often in these situations, it’s simply holding the space – in silence – as they work out for themselves what it means to them and how they want to take it forward as they can now step back to see it for what it is. Sometimes having an external person you can trust to help you regain perspective of your reality, despite how emotionally charged it will feel for you, is something every professional needs. It also indicates that your client believes that you see them as who they are and knows that you will be there for them in those emotionally charged moments. And eventually, they become an opportunity where they can create their own learning bubbles.
Creating a confidential and safe space for my clients
Every conversation is an opportunity for having a coaching conversation. This relies on the sensitivity of the coach to know if they have psychologically contracted with the client in those moments to work on their immediate challenges and their longer-term goals.
Being available to engage in these meaningful conversations, whether formally or informally, requires me to let go - physically, mentally and emotionally - of what’s important to me, and focus on what’s being shared with me directly, subtly, or even subconsciously. Gently, and with genuine curiosity, I ask what’s going on or what’s happening as there’s often an unusual tension in the air that seems to be making my client act indifferently. For me, it’s necessary to comfortably operate in this paradox of both having the ability to concentrate and focus on the now, and the capacity to zoom out to see the bigger picture/context of their situation. It's through this process of sensing and curiosity that enables me to align myself and have that coaching presence to continuously create and maintain that safe and confidential space to begin their exploration, starting from what's most important, or from where they are willing to start from.
How I create, mediate and maintain this open, safe space for exploration
I often notice that I'm leaving my present reality to match where the other person is starting from: this may include some mimicry in terms of tones, word choices, phraseology, syntax, breathing, body language etc. Through this sequence of events, I sense that I naturally shift my position to that of a coach, often without the other person even realising that it has happened. This is why, as I shared above, informal coaching is as important in my practice as formal coaching. The outcomes will depend on what is permitted by the other, whether stated implicitly or explicitly. Bridging the psychological distance between the coach and the client influences the quality of conversations that can be had, and it requires us to use all our senses well. For example, sometimes some of the challenges shared are more brain-based; therefore you have to be able to hold the space, but at the same time, you need to know how to use your heart in terms of how to express and share things. There are times where you can't always consciously diagnose what's happening, and so you rely on that intuition to help you, guide you, but through the intuition, you start to learn what some of those are, so that you can be more ready to answer differently.
This is why silence is such a powerful tool. There’s silence for thinking, silence for consoling, silence for just being creative for example, and knowing when and how to emerge from the silence and re-enter the conversations can be a useful moment of learning/reflection. There are no magic formulae for how long to wait in silence as you're listening to what's emerging, but instead it’s important to recognise our client’s implicit permissions to continue moving forward despite how uncomfortable it might be. We might even call this pacing, and it's even more important to match their energy and then with subtle non-verbal hints like tone or breathing to offer hopefully even more possible choices as they process their situation. However, it's essential to differentiate between being uncomfortable and resisting when sitting in silence. Recognising the different ways our clients open up and share what's impacting them, is something that I believe we need to remember for the lifetime of your coaching practice, and this will continue to help us build that quality coaching space.
Another useful principle I choose to uphold, and, I learned exceedingly early in my practice is that I should never own my client's solution. This creates an unnatural dependence on the coach by the client, and this was something I never wanted in my practice. The goals set by my clients can range from seeing immediate results in a short time frame, whilst at other times it simply takes time, resources, and opportunity to see their results become a reality. Thus the quality of attention necessary for the types of coaching goals I’m working with will vary in both intensity and frequency. Knowing that there is this range, as the coach, I am comfortable with my clients contacting me as and when they need to – to work on something specific which is valuable to them and requires my particular expertise and services as they go on their journey. For my business and practice, this is what I think a good partnership through good coaching should eventually look like.
Maintaining my presence and contribution in a bubble-like container for safe and confidential coaching
Connecting with my clients in a bubble-like container for safe and confidential coaching that I am capable of creating and sustaining, also requires me to keep my own presence and sense of self -which is hopefully wise enough to hold the range of feelings and emotions - and respond appropriately without judgement and criticism. I am more aware of how the confidential space I can create is as connected to the coexistence of silence and listening: betwixt the spoken words and the expressive body language silence fill the empty spaces to form a bubble-like space that establishes a psychologically safety and connection between the coach and their client.
It’s being comfortable using both as tools to help us better make sense of what’s going on for our client. It's just not the ears listening, but you're using all your senses to listen and observe in order to collect comprehensive data of various possible aspects of that person, put it together and then process what this might mean from the information shared to respond appropriately. This often happens subconsciously in a moment, and simply becoming more aware of this intuitive process will strengthen our capacity as a coach. This means that it's as important to know thyself and know how to use one-self in these situations without being subsumed by the needs of the client, e.g. transference. Hence, it's as essential to work on ourselves while we are working with others to ensure that we are genuinely fit for practice.
Flexing my coaching style in a first meeting
What I have shared above is much easier to do with my clients when I have already have a working relationship. However, if it’s the first time meeting my clients, I need to modify my behaviour and use facets from my coaching style to have our first conversations. The clients typically share one of two responses - apprehension and curiosity - more often starting with the former when we meet for the first time. I would say this is normal because it's not clear what sort of communication, direct or indirect, they have received about coaching and so starting to engage with someone from a defensive position is very normal (and another useful indicator of the culture of the organisation they’re working in ).
In these first meetings, aka chemistry meetings, it's less about what is coaching (though there is still some explanation required) but more about the benefits of receiving coaching. Therefore it is essential for my potential clients to experience my style of coaching and then for them to determine whether there is sufficient fit, and whether it meets their requirements for what they see as a useful partner to enable them to work through their specific professional and personal challenges. From my experience of these first meetings, it's more often about having that equivalence of understanding their situation, and how you might be able to help them by also giving examples of other cases/stories of others who might have been in comparable circumstances. Importantly, it's a simple assessment of how well you are listening to them and emphasise with their reality and situation. And can you then share where their growth potential might be, however challenging that might be for the coach to directly share from the evidence shared earlier by the client or from earlier 360 interviews.
My key learnings and reflections
In "Making sense of what I do, how my coaching practice is taking shape", I focus more 'scientifically' of the observable ways other 'likeminded' coaching practitioners would look at a practice. In this blog, I delve deeper to observe internally what it is I am doing to find those similarities across my practice. Comparing these two pieces, I believe it’s an extension, or deepening of my understanding, of how I work as a coach. And, as I often do at the end of each of my blogs, I share below my key insights from reflecting upon writing this piece.
Finding the words to describe what it is I sense that I am doing has resulted in a more qualitative and descriptive piece of my experiences. At the same time, the patterns that I’m observing from my anecdotal evidence is drawn from a few thousand hours of coaching conversations. While a flawed methodology that can't be independently verified, in the scientific sense, it's the best evidence I can provide of how I do coaching and be a coach I present to my market.
Sharing and describing my experiences is deeply personal and finding the right word to explain what it means for me, may represent something acutely different for another reader. And here, I ask for some latitude in expression.
Being able to talk about how I coach has resulted in conversations with and making comparisons against, other coaches who are comfortable talking about how we each practice. It has been through these peer conversations that I have been more able to form the words of what I sense I am doing.
Focusing on key moments within coaching conversations helps me to be more aware of what I’m doing, and learn in the moment and retrospectively, how I can improve and sustain the quality of coaching I want to provide as a good, and continually fit for practice, coach.
Coaching is a life long learning, and so what I know now will develop as I learn more which, along with my clients, makes it an inspiring journey to be on. And I look forward to future blogs to connect my insights and critically connect with published literature in order to deepen my understanding and hopefully continually contribute to the broader community of knowledge from my personal knowledge base.
Connect with Yvonne Thackray and read her other posts published on the good coach.
